Back in 1969, Richard Nixon had just become president, the Vietnam War was raging, Neil Armstrong had landed on the moon, and the unemployment rate ended the decade at 3.5%. Fast forward 49 years and the unemployment rate is back at levels last seen in 1969 – see Figure 1.

The title is a comment that came from Fed Chief Jerome Powell. He made the remark at last week’s quarterly press conference, which followed the Fed’s decision to hike the fed funds rate by 0.25% to 2.00-2.25%. It’s the eighth quarter-point rate hike since the Fed began boosting the key rate in late 2015.